How to win tenders to supply the education sector

This two day workshop (on Thur 23 January and Thur 06 February 2025) is part of the University of Exeter’s Evolve Futures programme of business support services, products and activities, all fully funded through the Cornwall & Isles of Scilly Good Growth Hub and Shared Prosperity Fund.

The Evolve Futures programme brings together SMEs, sector experts, researchers and entrepreneurs to support business growth and opportunities through sharing and building best practices around sustainable and inclusive activity, learning about effective and practical business foundations as well as applications of new technologies and innovations and enabling good growth.

These events aim to:

• Share expertise, best practices and build skills to support company resilience and long-term growth
• Provide opportunities to network with peers and experts to build community knowledge and valuable connections
• Support attendees from the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly region who are keen to grow, develop and innovate.

• Are you seeking to supply the education sector?
• Do you know where to find contract opportunities in the education sector?
• Do you have the skills to develop a winning bid?

The UK education supply chain sector is worth over £400 billion per annum, representing significant supply chain opportunities for businesses across all areas of activity and geographies.

If your product or service could be part of the education sector’s supply chain including critical campus services, teaching and equipment, technology or digital infrastructure, this workshop is for you. .

Workshop Details:

Join us on Thur 23 Jan and Thur 06 Feb 2025 for this fully funded workshop. It will in person only and be delivered across the two days, between 09.00 and 16.30 each day.

The sessions will be practical, interactive and hands-on, showing you how to:

• Find and assess sector-specific tender opportunities

• Learn about up-to-date sector drivers, frameworks and changes to legislation

• Plan your approach and identify resources

• Develop responses and structure compelling answers

• Devise a winning theme, demonstrating your organisation's credibility and capability

• Manage a winning bid or move on and learn from an unsuccessful one

You’ll also gain insights from experts who work in education sector procurement or have procured into the sector, who will be sharing their top tips and advice.

There will also be opportunities to review a proposal that you may already be working on and for a follow up one-to-one discussion for your particular bid support requirements.

This workshop is designed for those who:

• Want to supply their products or services to the education sector and need to understand the complexities of doing so through a competitive tender process

• Are responsible for responding to Invitations to Tender (“ITT”) or Request for Quotation (“RFQs”), developing proposals and writing tenders as part of business development for their organisation

• Are new to - or have limited experience of - writing commercial bids or tenders either generally or within the education sector specifically.

Your trainer for this workshop is Naomi Fox-Smith, a highly successful Bid Writer with over 15-years’ experience of helping organisations win valuable contracts through her mastery of the dark art of bid writing and as a Bid Coach, she seeks to empower and enable people to write their own winning bids, through high-impact bid skills courses and bid services.

Having learnt the language of procurement and the optimum approach to writing and structuring answers, Naomi has developed a powerful bid response framework which achieves high scores from bid evaluators.

With a particular focus on supporting SMEs, Naomi has helped her clients transform their win-rates and win millions of pounds of contracts and funding.

This workshop will be in person only at the Tremough Innovation Centre (Sennen Suite), Penryn Campus, Penryn, Cornwall, TR10 9TA

The University of Exeter has been commissioned to deliver the EVOLVE FUTURES project on behalf of the Growth Hub by the UK Shared Prosperity Fund as part of the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Good Growth Programme. By attending this workshop you confirm you are happy for your data to be shared with the Growth Hub. The Growth Hub provides expert, independent and impartial guidance to take your business to the next level with funding and business support. More information on the University's privacy policies can be found here. For more information on Growth Hub’s own privacy policy, please visit this page.

The UK Shared Prosperity Fund provides £2.6 billion of funding for local investment by March 2025. The Fund aims to improve pride in place and increase life chances across the UK by investing in communities and place, supporting local business, and people and skills. For more information, visit https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-shared-prosperity-fund-prospectus

University of Exeter - https://www.exeter.ac.uk/

To aid organisation of this event, attendee information may be shared with relevant staff in the University e.g. a list of attendees could be provided to the University host or guest speaker. We will store your information securely, so that we can communicate to you about the event (e.g. cancellation of event, changes to the itinerary, a satisfaction survey).

Confirmation of your attendance at this event will be stored confidentially by the Evolve Futures programme for a period of up to seven years to allow us to comply with our funder. Your details will also be shared with the Growth Hub (CIOSGH) as we are working together to deliver Good Growth Commissioned services to businesses in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.

We delete our access to personal information on Eventbrite after 6 months.

More information on the University's privacy policies can be found here. For more information on Eventbrite's own privacy policy, please visit this page. For more information on Growth Hub’s own privacy policy, please visit this page.

How To Apply:

If you are Cornwall or Isles of Scilly-based and interested in applying for a place on this workshop, please use the 'Register' button to access the application form. The number of places are stictly limited.

Please apply for a ticket including all the necessary company information. We will then review your application and contact you to confirm your place.

Should you have any queries about the programme, or if you would like to find out more about the wider Evolve Futures activities, please contact Frances Tanner on [email protected]

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Tremough Innovation Centre (TIC) - Sennen Suite, Penryn Campus, Penryn, United Kingdom